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In reading a description of a cartoon I came about the following sentence:

But the shadows of the men are not the real reflections of the men but younger versions of themselves.

For me the last word sounds wrong; I would go for "younger versions of them" or "younger versions of their selves".

Am I completely mistaken?

Any help is very much appreciated! Franziska

herisson
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MsPodesta
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    The only exception that would make any sense is if you used the word 'self' in a spiritual sense. Even so I personally would never use 'their selves'. It just sounds horrible. – chasly - supports Monica Oct 27 '15 at 21:27
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    Possible duplicate of Why "themselves" and "himself", where the querent hisself starts off by saying In the earliest grades of elementary schools, students learn that "hisself" and "theirselves" are not words. I do not understand why this is.** OED says *theirselves* is "nonstandard and regional after C18", but I don't really object to it - it's certainly not "abominable" in my opinion. – FumbleFingers Oct 27 '15 at 21:36
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    @FumbleFingers - theirselves looks worse in writing than it sounds to my ear. I think I could probably slip it into a spoken conversation without raising too many eyebrows. – Kristina Lopez Oct 27 '15 at 21:43
  • On the other hand, I don't see OP's specific context as any kind of "special justification". It's the same as any other, where the "standard" form would be *themselves. Just them* or two-word *their selves* both strike me as far more "strange" than *theirselves*. – FumbleFingers Oct 27 '15 at 21:44
  • thank you for opinions, especially the comment on the spiritual sense helped me to clarify things for myself – MsPodesta Oct 27 '15 at 21:54
  • do you all agree with fumbleFingers that "them" is wrong here? after all the persons themselves are not aware of the shadows they cast to the wall behind – MsPodesta Oct 27 '15 at 21:54
  • @MsPodesta "them' is wrong in this context because the 'them' is expected to be the same as the subject of the sentence. We're expecting 'themselves'. – Mitch Oct 27 '15 at 21:57
  • @Mitch Isn't it the opposite way around? -> Lisa and Tom are looking at themselves in the mirror, the mirror gives a reflection of them? – MsPodesta Oct 27 '15 at 22:01
  • @MsPodesta Opposite?? Where did this mirror come from? I'm talking only about the last word in the sentence in the OP – Mitch Oct 27 '15 at 22:09
  • @Mitch I thought that when we use 'themselves' the subject had to be the same not when we use 'them', this is why I thought the sentences (the one with the shadows and the one with the mirror) were analogous but apparently they aren't... Does that mean that the verb we use plays a role here? Do we say "the shadows of the men are younger versions of themselves" but "the shadows of the men show a younger version of them"? – MsPodesta 13 mins ago – MsPodesta Oct 27 '15 at 22:30
  • Can you give us more context for the quotation? What is the source, and what is the cartoon being discussed? – herisson Oct 27 '15 at 23:05
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    In my opinion, "them" is fine. The subject of the sentence is "the shadows of the men," and the final word of the sentence does not refer back to this subject ("the shadows"), so it does not need to be reflexive. – herisson Oct 27 '15 at 23:07
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    I don't think this question is a duplicate of the one asking why themselves isn't theirselves, in part because their selves doesn't mean the same thing as theirselves. An Ngram graph for "their selves" shows very modest but increasing use of the phrase "their selves" between 1920 and 2005. Many of the recent Google Books search matches for theirselves, in contrast, are in grammar books criticizing the usage. – Sven Yargs Oct 29 '15 at 18:45

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"Themselves" is a reflexive pronoun and is primarily used when the subject of the sentence is also the recipient of the action: "He tripped and cut himself with the knife he was holding." Hence, although many writers these days would not hesitate to write "younger versions of themselves," "younger versions of them" is actually correct. If you are a prescriptivist, go with the latter; if a relativist, the former.

"Theirselves" is not standard English and is considered ignorant or uneducated. You could, however, quite correctly write a phrase such as "versions of their younger selves."

As Fowler repeatedly points out, in cases like this one the problem usually runs deeper than is apparent. (The use of the word "reflections" to avoid repeating "shadows" is another symptom.) Recasting the sentence is usually a better cure, in Fowler's view. For example, "But the men's shadows are younger versions of them, not real shadows."

PaulL
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  • In the original sentence, I think that adding "of", as in the following example, would clarify it and perhaps make it more grammatical: "But the shadows of the men are not the real reflections of the men but of younger versions of themselves." – Dustin G Jun 04 '20 at 12:14